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Royal Rumble (2014)
Royal Rumble (2014) was a professional wrestling pay-per-view (PPV) event produced by WWE and presented by Jackson Hewitt which took place Sunday on January 26, 2014 at the Consol Energy Center in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. It was the twenty-seventh annual Royal Rumble, the first to be held in the city of Pittsburgh and the first WWE pay-per-view in 2014. The event featured four professional wrestling matches and one pre-show match, two of which were for championships. The main event was the Royal Rumble match, a battle royal in which wrestlers enter the ring at regular intervals. Batista won by last eliminating Roman Reigns to become a two-time Royal Rumble winner. Elsewhere on the event's card, Randy Orton successfully defended the WWE World Heavyweight Championship against John Cena, Bray Wyatt defeated Daniel Bryan, and Brock Lesnar defeated Big Show. On the event's pre-show, The New Age Outlaws defeated Goldust and Cody Rhodes to become the new WWE Tag Team Champions. The event is known for the overwhelmingly negative crowd response during the Orton-Cena title match, as well as towards the end of (and after) the Royal Rumble match, when the fans booed the Rumble winner Batista and repeatedly chanted for Daniel Bryan (who had competed earlier in the night and was not involved in the main event). Fans worldwide (including retired wrestler Mick Foley) voiced their displeasure over social media, and the event was covered by many major news outlets as one of the worst Royal Rumble pay-per-views. However, the bout between Daniel Bryan and Bray Wyatt was highly praised by fans and critics. The event also marked the final wrestling appearance of CM Punk, who walked out on WWE the next day despite still being under contract and subsequently signed a contract to compete in the UFC. Production Background Since 1988, the Royal Rumble has been an annual event held by WWE and is typically shown on pay-per-view. The event is highlighted by the Royal Rumble match, a battle royal whose participants, entering at timed intervals, aim at eliminating their competitors by tossing them over the top rope, with both feet touching the floor. The winner of the match is the last wrestler remaining after all others have been eliminated.The 1988 match involved 20 wrestlers, while the 2011 match had 40; all the others, including the 2014 match, had 30 participants. 20 wrestlers were officially advertised for the match where the winner would receive a WWE World Heavyweight Championship match at WrestleMania XXX. On the final episode of Raw before the Rumble on January 20, Batista returned to WWE after an absence of nearly four years, and the Rumble was scheduled to be his first return match. On the same episode, Director of Operations Kane announced that CM Punk would be the first entrant in the match. The remaining 18 wrestlers advertised were Alberto Del Rio, Rey Mysterio, Tag Team Champions Goldust and Cody Rhodes; Intercontinental Champion Big E Langston, Kofi Kingston, The Miz, R-Truth, Xavier Woods (who eventually did not participate), Fandango, United States Champion Dean Ambrose and his Shield teammates Seth Rollins and Roman Reigns; The Wyatt Family's Luke Harper and Erick Rowan; Damien Sandow and The Usos (Jimmy Uso and Jey Uso); Bad News Barrett was originally advertised but later removed from advertisements. Storylines The card consisted of five matches, including one on the preshow, that resulted from scripted storylines, where wrestlers portrayed villains, heroes, or less distinguishable characters in scripted events that built tension and culminated in a wrestling match or series of matches, with results predetermined by WWE's writers. Storylines were produced on WWE's weekly television shows, Raw and SmackDown. A highly promoted match featured WWE World Heavyweight Champion Randy Orton defending the title against long-time adversary John Cena. At Survivor Series in November 2013, Orton successfully defended his WWE Championship against Big Show, on the same night the World Heavyweight Champion John Cena defeated Alberto Del Rio to retain his title. After Orton's victory at Survivor Series, Cena came down to the ring with his title, and celebrated with the crowd as The Authority (Triple H, Stephanie McMahon and Kane) looked on, much to Orton's chagrin. The next month, at the TLC pay-per-view, Orton defeated Cena in a Tables, Ladders, and Chairs match to unify the two titles into the new WWE World Heavyweight Championship. On the December 30 episode of Raw, Cena was awarded a rematch for the title against Orton at the Royal Rumble, with the match stipulation of a traditional one-on-one singles match, except that it could be won by pinfall or submission only. On the January 13 episode of Raw, Orton suffered an upset loss to Kofi Kingston and took out his frustrations by attacking Cena's father, who was attending the event at ringside. On the December 30, 2013 episode of Raw, Brock Lesnar returned with his manager, Paul Heyman, to announce his intentions to challenge the winner of the upcoming WWE World Heavyweight Championship match between Randy Orton and John Cena at the Royal Rumble. Lesnar then dared any wrestler who disapproved of that notion to challenge him, which was answered by Mark Henry, and a brawl would ensue, ending with Lesnar delivering an F-5 to Henry. The following week on Raw, Henry challenged Lesnar again, only to have Lesnar dislocate his elbow with the Kimura lock in storyline, which led Big Show to come out afterwards to confront Lesnar. On the January 10 episode of SmackDown, Big Show issued a challenge to Lesnar, Paul Heyman accepting on behalf of Lesnar and scheduling the match for the Royal Rumble event. Announced on WWE.com, Goldust and Cody Rhodes faced The New Age Outlaws (Road Dogg and Billy Gunn) for the WWE Tag Team Championship on the Royal Rumble Kickoff Show preceding the pay-per-view. This match was made when The New Age Outlaws defeated Cody Rhodes and Goldust in a non-title match on the January 17 episode of SmackDown due to a distraction from Vickie Guerrero. On the October 28, 2013 episode of Raw, The Wyatt Family (Bray Wyatt, Luke Harper and Erick Rowan) attacked Daniel Bryan backstage, which ignited a feud between the two. The next month at Survivor Series, Bryan teamed with CM Punk and defeated Harper and Rowan. The rivalry between Bryan and the Wyatt Family continued in December, as the latter defeated the former in a 3-on-1 handicap match at TLC, with Wyatt attempting to recruit Bryan in the previous weeks. On the December 30, 2013 episode of Raw, Bryan defeated Harper and then Rowan in a gauntlet match so that he could face Wyatt, whereupon Harper and Rowan interfered for a disqualification and beat him down, before announcing he would join the Wyatt Family. However, on the January 13, 2014 episode of Raw (after Bryan and Bray Wyatt were defeated by The Usos in a steel cage match), Bryan betrayed Wyatt and attacked him, culminating with Bryan hitting his flying knee finishing maneuver on Wyatt. The following week on Raw, Bryan explained that his joining the Wyatts was a ruse to infiltrate the stable and bide his time to strike, and that he would wrestle Wyatt at the Royal Rumble event. Aftermath After the Royal Rumble event, CM Punk did not appear and was not mentioned on Raw the next day. Despite being advertised for the SmackDown taping on Tuesday, he also did not appear in front of the live audience. By Wednesday, WWE.com stopped advertising Punk for future events. It was reported by the Wrestling Observer that on Monday, Punk had legitimately walked out on WWE when he informed Vince McMahon that he was "going home". On February 20, McMahon indicated to investors that Punk was "taking a sabbatical". However, in an interview published in late May, Punk indicated that he had retired; he was questioned "How does it feel to be retired at 35?" and replied with "It feels good." Punk's WWE contract subsequently expired in July 2014, thus making the Royal Rumble his final on-screen appearance. The post-Rumble Raw on January 27 began with Triple H and Stephanie McMahon (The Authority) addressing the Rumble event and mocking the audience for not getting what they wanted. When Daniel Bryan came out and confronted them about not being inserted into the Rumble match, and then demanded to be inserted into the Elimination Chamber match and refused to leave the ring until they did, he was attacked by the Shield, but was then saved by John Cena and Sheamus. As a result, Bryan, Cena and Sheamus later teamed together to take on the Shield in a 6-man tag match in which all three members of the winning team qualified to participate in the Elimination Chamber match (in which Randy Orton would defend his WWE World Heavyweight Championship) at the eponymous pay-per-view. During that match, The Wyatt Family interfered, causing the Shield to be disqualified and thus Bryan, Cena and Sheamus qualified for the Chamber match. Cesaro and a returning Christian also qualified for the Chamber match by defeating Dolph Ziggler and Jack Swagger respectively. For costing them the spots in the Chamber match, the Shield vowed revenge against the Wyatt Family, which set up a match between the groups at the Elimination Chamber pay-per-view. At Elimination Chamber, Randy Orton retained his WWE World Heavyweight Championship by winning the Elimination Chamber match against Daniel Bryan, John Cena, Cesaro, Christian and Sheamus. During the Elimination Chamber match, the Wyatt Family once again interfered to cause Cena's elimination from the match. Also at Elimination Chamber, Batista defeated Alberto Del Rio, with the negative audience reaction to Batista continuing, even prompting the audience to cheer Del Rio. Meanwhile, Bray Wyatt was victorious once again with the Wyatt Family defeating the Shield. Because of the boisterous negative reaction, Batista responded to the audience on the February 28 episode of SmackDown, saying he didn't come back to be liked, only to be the next WWE World Heavyweight Champion, thus turning into a villain in the process. The scheduled WrestleMania XXX main event was Orton versus Batista for the WWE World Heavyweight Championship. However, on the March 10 episode of Raw, Bryan and multiple fans "occupied" the ring and refused to leave, resulting in an irate Triple H agreeing to Bryan's demand for a match at WrestleMania, with the stipulation that the winner would be inserted into the WWE World Heavyweight Championship match at the event. At WrestleMania, Bryan was added to the match after defeating Triple H in the opening contest of the show, and would ultimately win the triple threat match, forcing Batista to submit and win the WWE World Heavyweight Championship. On May 12, Daniel Bryan announced that due to injuries, he would require neck surgery, which he underwent on May 15. Bryan was stripped of the WWE World Heavyweight Championship by the Authority on June 9 as he was not healthy enough to defend his championship. Cody Rhodes and Goldust failed to regain the WWE Tag Team Championship from The New Age Outlaws on the post-Rumble Raw, as the match ended in no contest after Brock Lesnar attacked Rhodes and Goldust. The following week, they received another rematch for the titles in a steel cage match, which the Outlaws won. The Outlaws' reign ended on the March 3 episode of Raw, when The Usos won the Tag Team Championship. Following Elimination Chamber, Wyatt feuded with Cena, with Wyatt wanting to prove that Cena's heroic act was a facade characteristic of "this era of lies" while also trying to turn Cena into a "monster". Wyatt went on to accept Cena's challenge for a match at WrestleMania XXX, which Cena won despite interference from Luke Harper and Erick Rowan. In May at Extreme Rules, Wyatt defeated Cena in a steel cage match, after repeated interference from the rest of The Wyatt Family and a "demonic" child. Their feud ended at Payback on June 1, where, in a Last Man Standing match, Cena buried Wyatt under multiple equipment cases to win the match. Cena won the vacated WWE World Heavyweight Championship at Money in the Bank on June 29. On the February 24 episode of Raw, Brock Lesnar and his manager Paul Heyman voiced their complaints about Lesnar not being in the WWE World Heavyweight Championship match at WrestleMania. Instead, the Authority offered Lesnar a contract to face anyone else at WrestleMania. They were interrupted by a returning Undertaker, who confronted Lesnar. While Lesnar signed the contract for a match at WrestleMania with The Undertaker as his opponent, The Undertaker accepted Lesnar's challenge by stabbing Lesnar with a pen and chokeslamming him through a table. This set up a match where Lesnar would attempt to break the Undertaker's 21–0 undefeated streak at WrestleMania. Lesnar defeated Undertaker after executing three F5s, thus ending the streak. In August 2014, Lesnar defeated John Cena at SummerSlam, capturing the WWE World Heavyweight Championship for a fourth time. Results Royal Rumble entrances and eliminations Yellow ██ indicates an NXT superstar. Kane was already eliminated when he returned to eliminate CM Punk later in the match. By eliminating 12 men, Roman Reigns broke the record of 11, set by Kane in Royal Rumble 2001. Other on-screen personnel See also * List of WWE pay-per-view events * Royal Rumble Category:Royal Rumble Category:2014 Pay-Per-View Events Category:World Wrestling Entertainment pay-per-view events